Nasdaq OMX To Buy Three Units Of Thomson Reuters For $390 Mln

12/12/2012 9:27 AM ET

North American stock exchange Nasdaq OMX Group, Inc. (NDAQ) agreed Wednesday to acquire the investor relations, public relations and multimedia solutions businesses of Thomson Reuters Corp. (TRI,TRI.TO) for $390 million in cash. The deal, subject to regulatory approvals, is expected to close in the first half of 2013.

"In one acquisition, we accelerate and achieve our Corporate Solutions long-term objectives, while maintaining our balanced strategy of delivering value to shareholders. The combination of these two successful companies represents a distinct opportunity to create a truly unique client experience through premier content and best in class platforms," Nasdaq CEO Bob Greifeld said.

The three business to be acquired provides insight, analytics and communications solutions to more than 7,000 clients worldwide. Nasdaq said these complementary businesses will be integrated into its corporate solutions business, and continue to operate as independent companies.

The acquisition advances Nasdaq's strategy to create a comprehensive portfolio of products and services that will delivers critical market intelligence and communications solutions for its clients.

The New York-based exchange noted that the combination would create a global corporate services portfolio, with more diversified and comprehensive offerings to sell to Nasdaq's listing and corporate clients.

The deal will see Nasdaq becoming one of the leading providers of investor relations solutions and will add robust public relations and webcasting platforms. The deal will also provide Nasdaq's corporate solutions customers access to high-value investor relations data, including First Call and StreetEvents, through an exclusive relationship with Thomson Reuters.

Nasdaq anticipates the proposed deal to be accretive to its earnings per share within the first 12 months of closing, excluding transaction-related costs. Nasdaq also sees the deal generating attractive returns on capital.

Nasdaq's corporate solutions business is one of the leading providers of innovative products and services that power global business communications for today's forward-thinking public and private companies.

Thomson Reuters is the world's leading source of intelligent information for businesses and professionals. It delivers critical information to leading decision makers in the financial and risk, legal, tax and accounting, intellectual property and science and media markets.

"NASDAQ OMX is strategically aligned with our business and their complementary offerings present a great opportunity to leverage our combined experience, best practices and capabilities to deliver one of the industry's most comprehensive and innovative suites of solutions to IR, PR and communications professionals around the world," said Michael Cotter, Global Managing Director of Corporate Services of Thomson Reuters.

NDAQ closed Tuesday's regular trading session at $23.56, down $0.08 on a volume of 1.41 million shares. In the past 52-week period, the stock has been trading in a range of $21.03 to $27.34. TRI closed at $28.66, up $0.48 on a volume of 1.24 million shares.